Homecoming: An Observation

Homecoming: the first dance of the high school year. Pictures are planned to be at my date’s house at 6:30, but I arrive at 6:10. I figured, pictures are at my date’s house, so it would probably be a good idea to be the first person in our group there. Upon arrival, I step out of my car, look up, and find a purple house glaring back at me. The entire thing was purple: The mailbox, the siding, the garage door, the window shutters, etc. I was afraid to see what the dog looked like.

I walked up to the purple front door, corsage in hand, and rang the doorbell from the purple doormat. Strangely, I seem to want to move away from the door, so I step to the edge of the front porch. I guess I’ve always done that, because someone once told me to never stand in front of someone’s front door. I don’t know why, I guess it’s just one of those “polite” things that you do while in someone else’s company.

The familiar sound of Postal Service was emanating from all the windows. Apparently the music was much too loud, for it took at least three minutes for anyone in the house to notice someone was at the door. My date’s friend opened the door and said, “Wow, you’re early!” I replied,
“I figured I should be thoughtfully early.”
I walked inside and was relieved to find a dog that wasn’t purple, lying on the purple kitchen floor. I was instructed to sit on the gray couch with purple pillows until everyone arrived.

By 6:45, everyone had finally made it to the house. We snapped a few photos out in the front yard and by the time we were done, we had nine minutes to make our dinner reservations. On arrival, we were told that we had made our reservations at 6:30 instead of 7:00, which, I’ll have you know, was a complete lie. Three of our group’s members were present at the time of making the reservations at 7:00 and we even called ahead to make sure our reservations were correct. We ended up having to drive to the Uno’s across the street by the Super Wal-Mart--awesome.

It felt like an eternity for our food to come. During our wait, we made contemporary art out of our forks, and by contemporary art I mean precariously stacked fork towers. After we finally got our food and ate, we were on our way to the dance by 9:00. When we got inside the school, there was a mob-line for turning in tickets, but I made it through swiftly because I knew one of the moms working at the table.

After we had gotten tickets sorted out and items checked we headed through the trash bag tunnel to the main stairs. We had been talking about how we knew the DJ was going to play that song by Soulja Boy, and not two minutes later the song began to play. I’ve always found those little moments of synchronicity to be fascinating.

The cafeteria was decorated with green and gold streamers, which was about the only decoration I took notice of besides the trash bag tunnel. There was the characteristic sweaty mob of people in the middle of the cafeteria. And, by sweaty mob, I mean at least 200 people climbing on top of each other generating enormous amounts of heat. I noticed that most of the girls checked their heels at the entrance. I understand that they hurt or are uncomfortable, so I’ve never understood why they are so popular; purchased to be worn for only a few hours. Why not wear something in between fashionable and comfortable, rather than having your feet mashed by inexperienced dancers?

For the two and a half hours we were there, the DJ didn’t play a single slow song. There was grinding, and only grinding: Aggressive grinding, slow grinding, awkward grinding, and half-past sex grinding. Several times during the dance I saw a large group of people gathered around a couple that danced as if they had studied and practiced moves from Dirty Dancing for the entire month of September.

I am only proficient in two types of dancing: on and off. But, by the end of the night, I was actually having fun. I normally avoid school events as if I’d contract leprosy if I ever attended one. It was an auspicious change of heart and I am glad that I went. After the dance ended, my date wanted to go to an after-party; so, that meant I was going whether I liked it or not. We went to one of her friend’s houses where our group met up with several other people.

By the end of dancing and parties, I finally got home by 4:00 in the morning, having gotten lost twice on my way back home from my date’s friend’s house where the after-party was. I literally climbed up the stairs to my bedroom and saw that my bed cover and pillows were in a pile on the floor. Being as tired as I was, nothing could bother me, so I fell over on top of the pile and was immediately trapped in a willful coma.